Towards a Planet of Plenty

Permanent plenty, no longer a Utopian dream. We socialists have always contended that capitalism should be abolished because it mismanaged the means of production so that a very few – those who own the means of production – reaped great profits while the masses of the people were deprived of a secure standard of living. We would often prove this assertion by demonstrating the tremendous capacities which the modern industrial machine has; how it could satisfy the needs of everyone if it were run for that purpose; and how capitalism, instead, ran the industrial machine for profits. All that was and remains completely true. It remains the great and tragic paradox of our age – poverty in the midst of plenty. When the capitalists realise there is no profit in selling their goods, there are layoffs and slashing of wage’s. Food is left to rot in the granaries and storage houses, and hungry people starve in the midst of plenty. people starve in the midst of plenty and food is dumped when people cannot buy for they may not have the jobs or the money.

Capitalism is a wasteful and inefficient system. It cannot plan on either a national or an international scale. It deprives the mass of the people of products. Socialism could plan better, provide the people with all necessities. Socialism could take the vast resources which are available and use them for constructive purposes. The inefficiency due to capitalist competition; the shortages and high prices due to capitalist monopoly; the wars due to imperialist rivalry; the inefficiency and economic inequality due to the impossibility of constructive economic planning under capitalism – all would be things of the past. In their place could arise the new society of peace and plenty. That is why socialism is the burning need of the hour. Families go without in the midst of plenty. We have the natural resources, the machinery, the labour. Modern science has made comfort and culture and leisure possible for all. Who will deny the great potentialities for good inherent in our advanced economy? The owners of production have at their disposal all these wonderful opportunities, but have they used them to end poverty, maintain security and a high standard of living and keep the peace? No. Where, then, does all the wealth go to? The 1%. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer is always true under capitalism.

The capitalist system won’t work, for the very root of capitalism is all wrong. It is based on a contradiction, namely, that the man who owns the tools of production (the capitalist) does not work them, and the man who works them (the worker) does not own them. The working people themselves should own and operate the industries cooperatively, through common ownership. This would end production for profit and the waste of competing businesses. There would be planned production for the first time, increasing the output of wealth so that there would be plenty for all. We have all the means necessary to a high standing of living, shorter hours and certainly full employment for every able-bodied person. The kind of planned economy we envisage would, for the first time, make possible an end to wars between nations. Because the planned economy would include all countries. The aim of the working class would be to end capitalism and all forms of exploitation everywhere; and everywhere introduce a planned economy. The Socialist Party's aim is to create a socialist world. Science and new technology can make all the wheels of industry turn to produce the things people need. We must make this come true.

In the final analysis, the solution is that the profit-grubbing obstructionism by the capitalist class must be ended and it is unattainable only for those who think in terms of capitalist profits and the perpetuation of capitalist power. Workers cannot obtain plenty and security, deliverance from misery and war, by trying to reform the capitalist economic system. We have to abolish it. Then and not until then, can working people use the productive forces to provide plenty and security. The capitalist system, though the development of productive forces makes plenty possible yet it presses the standard of living of people ever lower.

Socialism is a system which is based upon plenty for all. Its aim is to raise the standard of living of all humankind far higher than that reached in the most advanced capitalist country. It means, therefore, the utilisation of the most modern and advanced means and methods of production. It means the most scientific utilisation of all the natural resources of the entire world. It means the closest cooperation of the peoples of the entire world. Socialism cannot be based on scarcity and want, for these breed inequality, rivalry, class divisions. Socialism seeks to eliminate these forever from the face of the planet. The capitalist system came into being only after a number of revolutions and half-revolutions. The period of its birth lasted for decades, The change from the feudal system to capitalism was not as drastic as will be the change from capitalism to socialism, for the latter implies not the change of one system of exploitation for another, but the elimination of all exploitation and class rule.

For world socialism. To this inspiring task, we summon all the workers oppressed by capitalism. Only a socialist world can give us peace and plenty. Look how the capitalist world totters on the brink of climate change destruction. The myriad evils of capitalism will disappear only with the destruction of capitalism and the building of socialism. We, socialists, refuse to join the reformists in leading the workers into the camp of capitalism. The working class must overthrow capitalism and that road does not lie through support of palliative reforms. The only road is the socialist road. It is the ballot that we use against capitalism. Vote, then, for socialism. Vote for the Socialist Party, the only party that keeps the revolutionary banner unfurled. The working class can organise and run society in the interests of all the people; the working class, and the working class alone, can and will open the door to the new socialist society of peace, plenty, freedom and security.